1. Field of the Invention
The invention in general relates to a stretcher for transport of patients. In more detail, the invention relates to a stretcher destined to be used on-board emergency and/or casualty vehicles, typically ambulances, for example in order to collect an injured person lying on the ground and transport her or him to a hospital or clinic.
2. Prior Art
As is known, the use of these stretchers generally includes resting the stretcher on the ground at a minimum height therefrom, such as to facilitate manual transfer of the injured person onto the stretcher, and then raising the stretcher with the injured person on it up to a similar height to that of the loading plane of the ambulance, and thereafter to load the patient into the ambulance in order to transport her or him to hospital, where the stretcher will once more have to be unloaded from the ambulance, hopefully without causing trauma or jolts to the injured party.
The stretchers at present in use in ambulances are made and equipped to facilitate and/or render less laborious some of the above-mentioned use stages. Notwithstanding the above, it is constantly true that during at least one of the above-cited use stages, the operators physically have to bear the weight of the stretcher with the injured party on it, which means that the operators are subjected to a considerable physical strain.
For example, stretchers known as “self-loading” are known, which comprise a rest plane for receiving the patient in a lying position, to which at least two support legs are associated, which legs are reclinable from an open position, in which they support the rest plane substantially at the same height as the loading plane of the ambulance, to a closed position, in which they support the rest plane at a height which is close to the ground, in order to facilitate the transfer of the patient onto the stretcher.
The support legs are generally reclinable independently of one another, so that during the loading and unloading stages of the stretcher to and from the ambulance the operator can use at least one support leg to support the weight of the stretcher.
The support legs are further generally associated to spring-activated systems which enable them to open automatically, but only after the stretcher has been physically raised from the ground.
This raising operation therefore must be performed manually by at least two operators, who have to bend over in order to grip the stretcher and thus have to raise it by brute force before the support legs can be opened.
As the raising of the stretcher is done after the injured party has been transferred onto the stretcher, this operation often represents a great strain and can lead to serious injury to the health operators performing it.
In order to alleviate this effort, stretchers for ambulances have been designed with are provided with a motorised system for raising the stretcher on which the patient is lying.
This raising system normally comprises an articulated system, for example a pantograph system, which directly rests on the ground and can assume a retracted configuration in which it supports the rest plane at a minimum height from the ground in order to facilitate transfer of the patient onto the stretcher, and an extended position in which it supports the rest plane at a greater height, about equal to the height of the loading plane of the ambulance.
The articulated system is associated to relative motorised means, for example a hydraulic jack, which activates the system between the above-cited retracted and extended configurations, causing the automatic raising of the rest plane.
However, during the stages of loading and unloading the stretcher to and from the ambulance, the above-mentioned articulated system must be kept in a retracted configuration, such that it cannot provide any rest support for the stretcher, the weight of which must therefore be physically supported by the health operatives.
As the stages of loading and unloading are done with the patient on the stretcher, this operation too is very laborious and can thus be cause of serious physical injuries to the operatives doing it.